Fifteen more aircraft would be added in the fleet of Air India Express (AIE) as part of the turnaround plan of Air India, Civil Aviation Minister Ajit Singh said on Thursday.

"The turnaround plan of Air India of which AIE is a subsidiary, envisages increase in the fleet strength of AIE from the present 21 to 36 aircraft by March 2018," he told the Rajya Sabha during Question Hour.

Singh, however, said that "as on date" there was no proposal for acquisition of more aircraft by

Air India Express.

AIE, a subsidiary of Air India, is headquartered in Kochi. The low-cost airline operates services mainly to Middle East and South East Asia.

To another query, Singh said there are plans to declare BhubaneswarAirport as an international airport.

"A new Domestic Terminal has been constructed at BhubaneswarAirport and inaugurated on March 5," he said, adding it may take a few more months to make it operational. The airport was named after Biju Patnaik in 1998.

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